Über XFCE

smillot · 2012-06-10 12:51:13

Since gnome 3 I dropped using it and I replaced it for XFCE.

I'm not here to tell you that I dislike gnome 3 but to ask you how to get back what I recently lost.

At the very beginning I missed a lot of cool things from gnome 2 in XFCE : battery applet, support for keys like screen luminosity or volume, and some others things.
I found then that I could just launch manually :

/usr/lib/gnome-settings-daemon/gnome-settings-daemon

and those feature appeared in XFCE as if I were using gnome.

That was cool, but recently an update may have broke this and I can't find which did these and how to get around this problem.

I'm getting this :

** (gnome-settings-daemon:26133): WARNING **: You can only run one xsettings manager at a time; exiting

** (gnome-settings-daemon:26133): WARNING **: Unable to start xsettings manager: Could not initialize xsettings manager.

** (gnome-settings-daemon:26133): WARNING **: Name taken or bus went away - shutting down

** (process:26140): WARNING **: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.ServiceUnknown: The name org.gnome.SessionManager was not provided by any .service files

Does someone know what I'm talking about?

Do you have an idea on how to make this working with XFCE?

Thank you!

brebs · 2012-06-10 14:19:13

XFCE has a battery applet - xfce4-battery-plugin.

My laptop's screen brightness keys work automagically in kernel 3.3.8 (via /sys/class/backlight/acpi_video0/brightness I believe), but don't work in kernel 3.4.1 (and /sys/class/backlight/acpi_video0 doesn't exist either).

For other keys, use xbindkeys.

DSpider · 2012-06-10 15:30:42

Do you have "dbus" in /etc/rc.conf on the DAEMONS line?

smillot · 2012-06-10 15:37:52

Thank you brebs for your answer,

I just added the applet and it works flawlessly, I remember I already tried to use it but it wasn't working, now everything seems right.
I don't yet know if it's related but when I plug/unplug my AC adapter I get those lines in messages.log :

(unplug)

Jun 10 17:22:28 localhost kernel: [165160.681512] EXT4-fs (dm-1): re-mounted. Opts: commit=600
Jun 10 17:22:28 localhost kernel: [165160.697780] EXT4-fs (sda4): re-mounted. Opts: commit=600

(plug)

Jun 10 17:22:31 localhost kernel: [165163.713660] EXT4-fs (dm-1): re-mounted. Opts: commit=0
Jun 10 17:22:31 localhost kernel: [165163.718144] EXT4-fs (sda4): re-mounted. Opts: commit=0

What's going on?

I didn't knew about xbindkeys so I looked @ xbindkeys and tried this :

# Increase volume
"amixer set Master playback 1+"
    m:0x0 + c:123
    XF86AudioRaiseVolume

# Decrease volume
"amixer set Master playback 1-"
    m:0x0 + c:122
    XF86AudioLowerVolume

# Toggle mute
"amixer set Master toggle"
    m:0x0 + c:121
    XF86AudioMute

I checked with "xbindkeys -k" and it matches my keys, BUT

typing "amixer set Master playback 1+" or "amixer set Master playback 1-" has no effect

(output)

smillot@latitude ~ $ amixer set Master Playback +1
Simple mixer control 'Master',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Playback 0 - 65536
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback 32820 [50%] [on]
  Front Right: Playback 32818 [50%] [on]

The mute command works!

Thank you!

smillot · 2012-06-10 15:38:53

@DSpider

Yes!

DAEMONS=(hwclock syslog-ng dbus fam networkmanager crond @http @mysqld)

brebs · 2012-06-10 15:46:00

smillot wrote:

Limits: Playback 0 - 65536

So +1 isn't going to make much difference, unless you press the key thousands of times. Use a value higher than 1

smillot · 2012-06-10 17:48:49

@brebs

Ah yeah I should have opened my eyes a little more!

I put 656, ~1% and it works well now.

# Increase volume
"amixer set Master playback 656+"
    m:0x0 + c:123
    XF86AudioRaiseVolume

# Decrease volume
"amixer set Master playback 656-"
    m:0x0 + c:122
    XF86AudioLowerVolume

Do I need to do anything so that this configuration file is used when I start up my laptop or is it automatically loaded?

Also, is there a way to get something that report the volume status like the gnome overlay?

I can of course adjust the volume when something is playing but can't blindly do it

brebs · 2012-06-10 20:26:18

To show the volume, I use notify-send.

DSpider · 2012-06-10 20:28:03

There's a program called volwheel.

# pacman -S volwheel

Custom skins go in "/usr/share/volwheel/icons/your_folder/" but the defaults will work ok, for now. You'll also need a clipboard manager (I recommend parcellite) and maybe some other stuff from here: Common Applications (taken from the end of the Beginner's Guide).

Have fun.

smillot · 2012-06-11 04:25:16

I tried your solution based on notify-send, I like the trick but it spams my desktop when hitting volup/voldown multiple times.
Didn't looked at volwheel atm but found xfce4-volumed in the AUR and I admit it fits my needs.
I just need to find out how to unmute volume (muting works, toggling back to unmute don't)

Thank you for your helpful answers!

Arch Linux

#1 2012-06-10 12:51:13

Über XFCE

#2 2012-06-10 14:19:13

Re: Über XFCE

#3 2012-06-10 15:30:42

Re: Über XFCE

#4 2012-06-10 15:37:52

Re: Über XFCE

#5 2012-06-10 15:38:53

Re: Über XFCE

#6 2012-06-10 15:46:00

Re: Über XFCE

#7 2012-06-10 17:48:49

Re: Über XFCE

#8 2012-06-10 20:26:18

Re: Über XFCE

#9 2012-06-10 20:28:03

Re: Über XFCE

#10 2012-06-11 04:25:16

Re: Über XFCE

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